Sam Harris’ book, THE END OF FAITH (W. W. Norton, $16.95), puts forth a "militant critique," according to reviewer Alan Wolfe, professor of political science and director of the Boisi Center for Religion and American Public Life at Boston College.

"Harris is on — no other word will do — a crusade. Religion in general, and Islam in particular, hold to beliefs that any mind searching for evidentiary proof would have to dismiss as absurd," Wolfe writes.

With that admitted, author Harris then hammers away specifically at the insanity of Islam in this recent publication. He sizes up realistically that the Allah-is-great religion is a killing force to undo the planet’s population. In that, Harris is correct. That’s exactly what the Koran demands of its devotees. There are no moderate Muslims in the light of the Koran; they are but cowards if they will not slaughter every "infidel," that is, the non-Muslim, the Jew in particular.

Therefore, realizing that Islam is abhorrent, Harris warns the planet that it might have to set loose drastic measures in order to insure the ongoing safety of non-Muslims. Understanding how crazy the Muslim "faith" is, the reader’s one side of the brain could very well agree with Harris’ thesis. On the other hand, most of us would hope for an alternative.

Wolfe writes in his review of Harris’ book: "Comparisons between Harris and the fundamentalists he opposes are strengthened by the fact that he, like they, have a taste for the apocalyptic. Since Islam by its very nature cannot live with the West, and since Islamic states are acquiring nuclear weapons, we might have to just take them out through ‘a nuclear first strike of our own.’ Killing tens of millions of people may seem like ‘an unthinkable crime,’ Harris acknowledges, ‘but it may be the only course of action available to us, given what Islamists believe.’"

Wipe them out with a nuclear blow? That’s what Harris concludes might be the only realistic solution to bringing closure to the Muslim murderers global.

J. Grant Swank, Jr.